Her Memoirs
by sychofrantic
Summary: She tells her story. Alternate season two. S&W, A&W. COMPLETE.


**Her Memoirs**

Disclaimer: Not mine, not me, not I etcetera.

Rating: NC-17

Pairing: Angelus/Willow, Spike/Willow.

Warnings: How I hath sinned, let me count the ways: major death, rape, torture, violence, abuse, swearing, het, mild blood play... the end.

Summary: She tells her story. Alternate season two.

* * *

**Prologue **

Let me start by saying I didn't write this at the beginning. I didn't want to start my journal on a presumptuous note, so I saved this small space on the page so I could introduce you properly. My name is Willow Marie Rosenberg and I was born in Sunnydale, California. Aside from holidays and such, I have lived there all my life. When I began this journal, I was only 16 years of age. Within that year I aged more than one human should; I grew up too fast. Well, that's what Spike says. If I were writing this introduction on the very day I began my journal, I would not have mentioned Spike at all. He was non-existent in my life at the time, he was a ghost that stayed in my mind only while he was there, then left seconds after. My main concern was Angelus; the most evil vampire in history. This is where I begin, and I beg you not to take the immaturity of my words to heart, as I can barely stand to look at them now.

**May 22****nd**** 1998,**

I don't know why I'm writing in this. It was placed on the edge of the desk alone, in a halo of unnatural light. It beckoned me from my curled up position on the floor, although I swore to myself that I wouldn't move. The rest of the desk was bare, save for an ordinary blue pen. I was somewhat confused by its presence, surely if Angelus wanted me to write, he would have left a pen that reflected sunlight and was smooth to the touch. But I secretly knew that the plainness of the writing implement was the reason my hand was gripping it now. Although in my fear I may forget things or misspell things, I want to recount to you what happened to me.

It starts as it always does, on a not so special night. It was slightly different than the rest, though, because I was nursing a broken heart. This has nothing to do with vampires yet; this is all about Xander Harris. My life-long crush Xander. Earlier that day, I found him getting some almost pornographic smoochies with none other than Cordelia Chase. That incident seems almost insignificant now, but at the time I was shattered. It seemed they had been seeing each other behind everyone's back for awhile, since the Order of Taraka incident. I tried to understand why Xander would do this. Didn't he realise how much I loved him? Anyway, I was frustrated and angry, my head seemed to pound with every thought I tried to think. With every step I took towards the deadly embrace of Angelus.

I was dizzy, my breath coming out in shallow pants as his hand squeezed tighter. Things clouded and became darker, as if someone was hanging layer after layer of black tissue over my eyes. I was dully aware of conversation being thrown back and forth around me, but was too busy trying to stay conscious to listen. 'I'm going to die,' I thought, as the cool hand squeezed tighter. I'm embarrassed at the one thought that ruled my brain; the library book that was one day away from being overdue. I tried to veer my thoughts away from that petty topic, but I kept thinking frantically of my soon-to-be blemished return record. I regretted that thought as I drifted into unconsciousness, wanting to see the faces of my friends one last time. I didn't and still haven't.

I awoke on the floor, where I was only moments before. The room I didn't and still do not recognise. Angelus was beside me, his arms wrapped around his knees in what could easily be seen as a child-like pose. I willed myself not to be fooled, but the watcher diaries and countless tomes where his name or face graced the pages were not enough to prepare me. He continued to watch me, as if I fascinated him. Pinning me down with his gaze, I could not move. I took sharp panic breaths, but it did nothing to ease the tightness in my stomach.

"I bet you wished you'd stayed asleep," he murmured, his lips barely moving. All I could do was stare back, but he didn't seem to care. "There's nothing more I would like to do now than crush you, yet I can't. Do you know why that is?"

I could only shake my head, but he seemed satisfied and didn't answer his own question, which now plagued me. He left soon after, ignoring my puzzled features and placing a thick diary on the tabletop. He asked nothing of me as he left, his face an emotionless mask. Confusion soon overruled my fear, and I wondered vaguely if it was a dream. It would have explained a lot, but not enough to satisfy me, so I stayed for what seemed like hours on the floor. I curled up to protect myself from the nothingness around me. But the diary called to me, and soon my eyes were flickering to it every few seconds. Without thought or much consideration of the consequences, I began to write.

**May 25****th**** 1998,**

As you can see by the poorness of the paper, which I am writing on now, I have tried many times to start the entry over the course of three days, but I haven't found the words to describe it. Loneliness is my constant companion. Every small sound seems loud to my ears, I want something to disrupt the silence, but noises now seem unnatural so I scarcely make them. I feel incomplete, at a loss. Why does Angelus want me here? What's my purpose? Despite the questions being filled with dread at first, they now hold desperation. Writing, I'm afraid, is my only comfort from Angelus' mind games, and barely that at best.

Every day he brings me fine foods. He carries the trays himself, and takes them away himself. I want to accept it, I really do, but such gestures occupy my every thought. Perhaps that was his intention, I do not know, to relieve me from the loneliness with meaningless actions that confuse me. Angelus does not strike me as the type who would do favours, but my sketch of him is rough. Is he playing mind games with me? Is this his plan, to drown me in my loneliness? Or perhaps he wants me to bite my nails till they bleed, pace the floor until a figurative hole is worn, spend nights sleepless and scared.

I can't help asking myself this same question: what has he planned for me? Will he torture me? Rape me? Or worse, will he make me fall for him? He does seem the type. I can't help tearing my hair out at the idea that I am doing what he had planned for me right now. But then, why the journal? This is my leash to the world, why does he let me write in it? Ugh, so many questions! I want to bury them deep in the corner of my mind, but I know I will never stop worrying until they are all answered. But will they ever be?

Sorry I had to stop writing, Angelus came in with my lunch. He watched me eat again, his lips pursed. He seemed to study the fork most of all, as I scooped up the food, then put it in my mouth. Then he would look at my lips as I chewed. When I tried to look away, all he said was, "Don't." Since the night at the high school, he hadn't raised a hand to me. Not to strike me, not to fondle me, not even to get my attention. But he did not flinch away from me, if my hand brushed his sleeve, or if my hair touched his knuckle. I wish I knew the significance of this. I wish I could read him, as easily as he can read me.

Today was no different. He provided me no objects of amusement but the diary, and my dish was scattered with olives. He seemed to have this thing with olives, for breakfast, lunch and dinner, no matter what, there would be at least one olive along with the meal. Sweet or savoury, snack or main, green olives, black olives, stuffed olives… luckily, I am partial to olives, so I didn't complain. Why was he so delighted when I popped a whole one in my mouth, why was he even more delighted when I ate it bit by bit?

He has given me no change of clothes as of yet, but I wash in the adjoining bathroom. I clean my clothes and dry them in there also, never leaving the bathroom as I do it. Luckily, he never comes in while I spend hours in there, washing and waiting for my clothes to dry. Well, not yet, anyway.

Tomorrow. Tomorrow I will find the courage to ask the questions that I most desire the answer to. He may, or may not answer. If he doesn't, I don't know what I'll do. What can I do in this cell, this cell that resembles anything but a cell?

**May 26****th**** 1998,**

I know it is late, but I must write this. I asked the question, after dinner, after the olives, I asked him. I asked, though quietly, "What have you planned for me?"

And the way he looked at me, like he really saw me. Not physically, but right into my soul, so even though I sat, I was short of breath. Then, despite my curiosity, I wanted to take back the question. I wanted to keep it the same, his eyes studying my lips, not my eyes, which he seemed to burrow into with his own. Should I look away? I wondered, my instincts telling me to do just that. But I couldn't, his eyes were the colour of mahogany but they burned like two sparks. Nothing was said for what felt like eternity, had I asked the wrong question? Offended him?

Obviously not, because he laughed. He stood over me, so even though a grin was on his face, he dominated me and made me feel half a foot tall. "Such eagerness. But honestly, I have nothing planned for you. Unless you want me to break you then leave you on the slayer's front porch."

"So this is about Buffy?" I asked.

This did seem to offend him, as his eyes darkened momentarily. But that was gone, before I could study it, analyse it like I hoped. And, for the first time, he touched me. It was a slight cupping of my left cheek, and I flinched away. His hand was cold, smooth without pores, inhuman. He wore no reaction, only a fixed smile that was as cool as it was warm, never even touching his eyes. This answered nothing. What was I for? His answer only served to deepen my uncertainty, and soon I was standing. What was I doing? I don't know, all I knew was that I was sick of it. The same clothes, the confinement, the confusion and the damn olives.

"What do you want from me?" I almost screamed. I was going for a quiet, convincing approach, but the endless days had worn me out and driven me to childish yelling.

As fast as a vampire should, he grabbed my upper arms. The world spun for a moment before coming to a sudden halt. I was flat on my back, Angelus kneeling over me, his knees digging into my hips. Fear made me shake and struggle, even if I knew it was useless. He simply dug his fingers into my arms, pressing me into the carpet. At that moment I feared he would kill me, his cool breath on my face felt like a death rattle, chilling me to the bone. He pressed his forehead to mine, forcing me to either close my eyes or look at him, I chose the latter merely because I feared death if I disobeyed what he was obviously trying to command.

"You have no idea," His breathing was ragged, which confused me, because vampire's don't breathe. "What you're asking for. This solitary emptiness? Not half as bad as what I could do to you…"

"Then do it!" I snarled.

I heard a slight shifting noise, and with a gasp I realised he had brought his demon forth. Its golden eyes glimmered threateningly at me, the teeth sharp and deadly flashed a wicked grin my way. Fear made my skin crawl, I thrashed and moaned, trying to get away from the deadly overbite as it lowered towards my neck. I guess I wasn't prepared for the stinging, or the burning as it sunk into my flesh. I jerked my head away desperately, but he fisted my hair in his hands and held me in place. I whimpered and tears rolled down my cheeks. Is that how they felt? The hundreds that died nightly at the hands of these things? The helplessness as it washes over you in waves, the fire that contaminates your blood, the endless screams and pleadings that echo only in your head, when all your mouth can do is try to breathe. My fingers warmed as they gripped carpet.

I grow weaker now as I write this, I know if I stop now, I won't continue in a long time. He took a lot of blood, and by the time he was finished I was scarcely conscious. He picked me up, cradling me as if I would break, and layed me on the bed which I had previously refused to sleep on. It is only with the strength of my hatred towards Angelus that I am finishing this. Should he read it and know, I do not care. Let him know, let him feel it, let him feel it as I feel his indifference.

**May 29****th**** 1998,**

I ache all over. No words can describe it, as if a giant heat has enveloped me, or an icy blizzard at times. I haven't seen Angelus since the night he drank from me, nor have I seen anything since I saw the beautiful clear pages of this very journal. Before I started writing today, I noticed the door had been left open. I first presumed it to be an act of carelessness, but the handle of the door touched the wall like an open invitation. Was I being set free, you may ask? But I can assure you it is not so. I was not a fool enough to believe that, though the hope in me encouraged it. I scrambled out of the bed, my forehead pounding viciously and my nose scrunching up in disgust at my own odour. I ignored it and crept towards the door and perhaps, freedom.

The rest of the house was spacious and extravagant. With velvet and silk decorating the walls and silence decorating the air. So used to it, I was oblivious to the small sounds I was making, neither was I uncomfortable. Somehow, I knew at that time, that I wouldn't escape. Not like this. But still I walked on, reaching a set of stairs that imitated the same rich, red carpet as the rest of the floor.

I was given the start of my life as a vampire jumped in front of me. A fledgling, I guessed, as it was in full game face, snarling like a rabid dog. I backed away and was immediately hindered by the stair behind me as I landed painfully on my behind. My heart pounded wildly in my ears, I thought, once again, that this would be the end. Was this his plan? I wondered, to feed me to a creature whose fangs rule his brain? Evidently not, when just as I was about to become a snack, Angelus emerged from the shadows and removed the other vampire's head.

"Like a lamb to the slaughter," he taunted, without a bat of his eye, "is that what you want to be, Willow, a lamb?"

"Better that than nothing," I said back.

"Really?" was his reply. I'm not sure I wanted to commit myself to an answer, he had ways of twisting words around. He seems to have a knack for saying the things normal people wished they could have said hours after, only he said it with timing and a wit envied by most. He ignored my lack of response and continued. "Has the loneliness driven you mad already, sweetness? Wishing death upon yourself by slobbering imbecile as the minutes pass like hours…"

"Why did you leave the door open?" I demanded, and he smiled coolly.

"Why not?"

What was he playing at? Still, I don't know, he confuses me as he probably confuses you. The one thing I find tedious of all is his tendency to answer questions with questions. In a way it is immature, but it is the most effective way to make me speechless or take a little too long to answer him. At this he grins knowingly, as if he is accustomed to me already. But he simply cannot be, for I am barely accustomed to him.

"Aren't I your prisoner? What do you hope to gain by letting me out?"

He looked at his nails, "I considered your proposal, you are to be moved to another room…"

"And if I don't want to go?" I challenged.

He grinned viciously, not even bothering to dignify me with answer. Don't rise to the bait, I told myself, and I didn't. I simply watched him as he did me, but I concentrated on his lips, as I couldn't bare the intensity of his eyes. I jumped as his teeth extended over his bottom lip in an eerie grin. Only then did my eyes flick to his, and I visibly flinched at the mocking look that was reflected there.

"You didn't have enough, sweetness? You want me to take more?"

"N-no." I curse the stutter that has been the bane of my existence for as long as I can remember.

"Good. Come along, then. You wanted something different? I shall give it to you. I'm afraid m'boy Spike is slowly becoming impotent with his little disability, you could be his get well present."

"I'll be no such thing!" I said stupidly. And once again, confusing me with his vampiric speed, his hand was in a stranglehold around my neck, his eyes centimeters from my own.

He looked angry for a second before his frown melted into a smile, "Spike will enjoy you, I'm sure."

**May 30th 1998,**

God, help me. Help me. I want my mother.

**May 31****st**** 1998,**

Sorry for the briefness of my last entry, I'll recount what happened yesterday regarding Spike.

He barely looked at me. Just sat, in his surprisingly cheap-looking wheelchair and chain smoked all day. His eyes only flickered up to me when I shifted on the giant bed. I tried conversation, like the idiot I am. I asked how he was. His response was to pull a cigarette from his lips, look at it oddly and before I knew it, he pounced. Well, attempted to. He used all of the strength of his arms to lever himself up from his chair, but it wasn't enough and he had to grip the bedspreads as he slid to the floor. This, sadly, dragged me towards him and I shrieked before attempted some rolling manoeuvre that sent me to the floor on the opposite side.

A little dazed, I had forgotten what had sent me there until his face was inches from mine. I whimpered, my fingers tingled but I daren't move them.

"I don't want you," he said viciously, grabbing me by the neck and pulling me up. Despite his damaged legs, his upper body was five times stronger than I was and soon I was kneeling before him, my neck still in his grip. "I don't need you here. Why don't you get out?"

"I c-can't," I said breathlessly and honestly, trying not to imagine Angelus' wrath as I said it.

"You can if I tell you. And if I tell you to do something, you do it. Now, get the fuck out."

He pushed me away and I scrambled to the door, but I was blocked by a wall of vampire. Angelus. He gripped me by my upper arms and in a fit of cluelessness, I struggled.

"Get off, get off." Random pleading, but said with anger and derision. My hands were itching like crazy as they scratched at his shirt.

"Willow, Willow. You're a very stupid little thing, aren't you?" He looked over to Spike, who lay back on the bed and watched the interchange with minimal interest.

"I know Spike is dreary company, but when I say 'stay put'…" He wrenched me to him, his mouth tickling my brow as he talked, "what do you think I mean?"

"Sorry, sorry, I didn't mean to, I…"

"Hush now," he said, stroking my hair in a parody of comfort, "It's okay. Just do what I tell you to in future, hm?"

Seeing no alternative, I nodded with a promise of obedience, though my insides were rebelling furiously at the idea.

"Good, now… kiss him."

And so it went. Spike and I kissed. He tasted of tobacco and nothing else. And Angelus watched, left, only to return with drawing supplies and he began to sketch us. Kissing Spike was not a revelation. It was very little. Neither of us wished to be the aggressor. And at times, Angelus had to get up from his chair and physically hold our heads together.

Then he began to position us. I didn't want to, I swear I didn't. At first it was only slight things. He took me by the knee, gently, and slid it over Spike's thigh. It was odd. He had no body warmth, yet he felt human. The denim of his jeans itched my bare leg and I squirmed uncomfortably. Angelus sighed.

He pulled our heads apart and I gave Spike an empathetic look. He ignored me. I thought Angelus had given up on our lukewarm foreplay, but he lifted me up slightly by my waist and placed me on Spike's lap and asked me, quite politely, to wrap my legs around him. This must have been awkward for Spike, I thought, because his back was twisted at an awkward angle and his legs were sprawled out flat behind me. He didn't seem to mind, just lay there submissively as his sire pushed him up so our chests touched. I blushed.

His hand, I thought it was Angelus', slid up my neck and bent it backwards. But it was Spike's, being physically manipulated by Angelus who tipped my head back and pressed his lips to my throat.

"Stay," he mocked, walking back to his place just as a crick started to form in my neck. I heard the scratching of charcoals for what seemed like hours, and Spike's lips grew no warmer on my skin.

"Now," he said finally, "Willow, get off Spike…"

He then proceeded to put me in a very odd position. I was to be hugging my knees, my eyes wide as I looked at the floor, and Spike was to be beside me, his forehead on my shoulder and his arm around me. At the time, his lack of rebellion against his sire surprised me. But between them, I know now, it was and is about power. And Angelus had the years, the emotionlessness and the functioning legs on Spike, who lacked all three.

Soon it was time for us to change positions and this time Spike sat on the edge of the bed while I sat on his lap and he hugged me in the most comforting way one could hug someone without providing any comfort whatsoever. Then he was cupping my face and our foreheads were pressed together, our eyes closed. We were lovers, I realised. In Angelus' mind and his drawings we were lovers. This was made clearer by the next position.

"Willow," he whispered, "take off your clothes, but keep your knickers on."

I tried to say no, I did. He just laughed and told me with humour in his voice that if I didn't he would removed all my fingers, one by one, then he would undress me himself.

Oh god, the humiliation. There was nothing like it. It was like stage fright in stereo. I didn't want to provoke anything, tried to do it as mechanically as possible, but it pleased him. Somehow it pleased him and I don't know why. I kept my hands crossed over my breasts and looked down. I felt burning all over and wished for him to say anything…

"Get on the bed, Willow. Get on the bed, face the door, cross your legs and hug yourself, just as you are now."

Except that. He told Spike to sweep my hair across my shoulder so it uncovered everything to him. Then Spike was to wrap and arm around my middle and kiss my neck.

Angelus drew furiously.

"Spike," he said, "take off your shirt. I want you in the same position, as you were at the start."

We were back in the embrace, his mouth on my neck, both of us completely naked from the waist up. It was then I began to cry, my fingers burning as they clung to naked arms. Oddly enough, that was it. He finished that picture and told us both to get dressed. At first, in horror, I thought he was going to make me stay in the same room as Spike but he sent me back to my new room and locked me in there. Neither has spoken to me since Angelus' last words.

And again, because of events described previous, I do hope you can forgive me for the briefness of my last entry.

**June 3****rd****, 1998.**

I'm going to ease into what happened before I was knocked unconscious by describing my new room. I may have forgotten to mention it, and for that I apologise. I had begged for Angelus to move me from that room quietly for several days prior to my 'escape'. All requests were met with drawn out 'no's that Angelus took great delight in, I'm sure.

In any case, he changed his mind. Don't ask me why, one because you'll be asking the pages of a journal and will look pretty stupid to the person beside you, and two because I simply don't know.

Sorry, I tend to get off track lately. I read somewhere that the brain is a muscle (not an actual muscle, it's an organ, but it's fitting for this saying) and it, like muscles, deteriorates when you don't use it. Such is it with what I suffer here, with no companion but you (journal) and myself.

This room provides no more entertainment than the old one, but blessedly it contained a shower, not a deep stainless-steel sink, soap, a loofah and a towel. I saw a rectangle of paint that was a deeper yellow than the rest of the bathroom, with nail holes around it that once suggested a mirror. I almost laughed. Well, the old me almost laughed. The new, slightly dented me looked at the discoloured paint and wondered.

I hate to sound like… well, a girl, but I'll tell you about the clothes. If you think Angelus is a pervert who would get off on anyone strutting around, half dressed in leather and crochet threads and stuff like that, you'd only be half-right. Because Angelus is a pervert, he just gets off on women dressed like they've just stepped out of the eighteenth century.

My closet was filled long, salmon pink gowns with flowing skirts and (literally) breath-taking corsets. Bright blue ones with exaggerated hips and long, draping sleeves, almost drowning in embroidery. All of them were of various shades with various patterns, but they all pointed to one inevitable conclusion.

Angelus. Is. Insane.

There's no other explanation. The years of embarrassment Angelus suffered at the hand of his alter-ego must have taken its toll on his already psychotic mind. Plus, all the waiting must have wound him tight as hell. And I was the one who had to deal with the consequences, I realised, as a minion of Angelus laced up my corset as I gripped the handle of my wardrobe and cursed. It hurt to breathe. It hurt to think about breathing. I couldn't even whirl around, my face a picture of disgust and indignation as the minion patted me on the bottom when he'd finished. I could only shuffle slowly around. By then he was gone, and the one who received the wrath of my stare was Angelus.

"Hello there, delicious thing," he said roughly, his voice touched with an accent I couldn't place.

I just looked at him with all the contempt I could muster, fingers numb.

He laughed. "Do you not like your pretty new clothes? I had them made especially for you."

"How generous," I drawled sarcastically. It was stupid to mock him, but I was tired and irate, and in no mood for yet another taunting session at the expense of yours truly.

"You should appreciate the things I give you Willow," he said, "No matter how badly I may treat you, I can always treat you worse."

'How lovely!' I'd thought with bitterness, 'Angelus' personalised version of the old 'things can always get worse' cliché.' But I daren't say it aloud. So I just stood there, my face the picture of submissiveness, but I knew some of my insolence had shone through because his smile dimmed.

"Blue," Angelus said suddenly, "It does not suit you at all." He swooped suddenly, and I made one of those squeaking noises I was beginning to loathe. He held my head back, poised to sink his teeth into my neck. And God help me diary, I wished it. I wanted the fangs to puncture my windpipe or spinal chord or something irreparable so that I might have some peace. But he didn't. He hesitated. And he drew back.

"Come," he said quietly, taking my hand, "I wish to draw Spike and you some more."

What he wishes, he gets. It was a fact I learnt to accept quite soon in our relationship, for I knew it was not my wish to be following docilely behind him while the wiring and woodwork that supported my enlarged hips creaked worryingly. He then led me into a room with a stranger in a wheelchair, dressed in similar garb to me, but the male equivalent. He had longish, curly brown hair that nestled just over a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles.

Was this a vampire, I wondered, or another human Angelus had captured for his pleasure.

"Spike, my boy," Angelus called, "stop being so melodramatic and come out of the shadows. Willow doesn't recognise you."

"Shame," Spike said, his eyes dull as he rolled into the light. He looked… pathetic, really. He looked like a poor teenage adolescent who had to borrow his father's suit for homecoming. It was too big, too mismatched. It dwarfed his lithe form. And I wondered diary, why this was so. Angelus obviously picked out my dress with meticulous care, well, aside from the unflattering blue, yet he selected those clothes for Spike.

"What are you doing?" Me. Yes, you'd think I would have learned by now, wouldn't you?

Spike glanced up, thinking I was talking to him. I was talking at him, but to Angelus, my fingers beginning to throb.

"I'm sorry," he replied insincerely, "I missed the part where I had to explain myself to you."

"Obviously," I growled. What was wrong with me, you might ask. I'm tired, I'm lonely, and I'm scared out of my mind. I want death, yes, if it means finality, pain… maybe. If it means change. Perhaps I was never really all there to begin with, I don't know. I was playing a dangerous game and I knew it. I just didn't care.

"Willow," he sighed, stalking over to me, "dearest, treasure… what's gotten into you? You're not… angry with me, are you?"

Angry. Yes. I wanted to scream at him. Or scream from him. So I did. The first time I said 'Hit me!' caught all of us off guard. But I liked that, I don't know why exactly. Maybe it was change, I don't know. I think I'm concussed right now. Once I started saying it, I couldn't stop. Now my hands were numb and the throb spread up and down them, pulsing faster as I repeated it, over and over.

"Hit me!" I screamed, "Hit me!"

Over and over, like a delightful mantra the whole world could hear. Not once did I feel the urge to block my ears, I wanted to hear it and feel it vibrate in my throat. Then at last he complied, and darkness followed. God, it was wonderful.

**June 7****th****, 1998.**

He awoke me yesterday, his face giddy.

"I knew there was something, something missing…" he giggled and I just stared at him, halfway between fear and resign, finally jaded enough not to ask what was wrong. "In my pieces, see!" He shoved a few bit of paper at me, and I obligingly looked at them through my good eye. The Lovers: Spike and I. I put them aside, thinking no less of Angelus than I did already.

"It's the colour. There's none, not a single drop…" He caressed my bruised eye with something akin to regret in his eyes, and…

"Are you stoned?" I asked incredulously. His eyes were glazed, his pupils huge.

"Take off your clothes," he replied. No, I was not jaded enough on this matter yet. I still burned all over, especially in my eyes. "All this blood, just below the surface, keeping you alive by thumping, up and down and around…"

He kissed and caressed me, fumbling, slipping and missing at every opportunity.

Yes, to your question. I did find pleasure in it. It wasn't difficult to, because for some reason my morals just didn't want to enter into this. Maybe they were gone. Out the window. I laughed a little at the thought.

"Wass funny?" He was more out of it by then, slurring and shaking a little, "I'll bite you. I'll cut you. Colour."

His fangs scraped over my stomach. It hurt, but there was something there. What was it? A little zing or something. Like and electric shock that felt… not nice, exactly. No, definitely not. No, especially when he buried them in there.

God, it's weird, but my thoughts were all just, "It's exactly like getting stabbed in the stomach." And it was, right down to the searing pain. My arms twitched, my fingers burning once again and curled involuntarily in his hair. And, with a humiliating sob, I remembered a long time ago. When Angelus was good, when I was good, when stuff in general was good. It's so strange thinking while you're being drained of blood, you feel… less. The intensity of your feelings fade and it's like you're… dying. Yes.

Today, once I woke up, I found a drawing of me. I was sprawled out on the bed, unconscious, of course, and naked. The picture was done in black charcoal, as usual, save for the red smear of chalk slipping down my belly.

"Colour," I said out loud. Then I picked up my diary, and began to write this entry.

**June 8****th****, 1998.**

RED. JOIN ME FOR A SMOKE AT 11 TOMORROW. ANGELUS WILL BE OUT HUNTING FOR AT LEAST AN HOUR. I'LL UNLOCK YOUR DOOR.

SPIKE.

**June 10****th****, 1998.**

Spike apologised for the, well, lameness of his message, but he could find no other ways to contact me, and the word amongst the minions was that Angelus monitored everything, except for the journal. So I would be safe to receive it.

"It's strange that he allows you that privacy," Spike conceded, handing me a cigarette. I declined.

I overstep myself, as usual. I'll start from the beginning of this little Spike/Willow adventure.

I was shocked to receive a message from Spike. I knew he hated me, that much was certain. I couldn't really grasp any reason why, though. Not that our previous encounters had been sunflowers and lollipops, I just thought with vampires, one had to work really hard to gain more than just their indifference. Extremes, like love or hate, are to be earned. Though I suppose not with Spike.

Just as he promised, the door was unlocked. I inhaled the freedom for two moments before sprinting towards the door. Dumb? Maybe. Presumptuous? Hell yeah. The moment I reached the door a six-foot-something minion stepped smartly in front of me.

"And where do you think you're going?" he asked politely.

"Um, well, Spike told me to meet him and-and," that was about the gist of what I garbled, but his eyes lit up with understanding and he grabbed me roughly by the arm and escorting me into a walled-off garden where Spike sat.

"So it's night," I said, once the minion had gone. I knew it was night, because he'd told me to meet him at 11 o'clock, but I honestly thought it would be light outside. I realised now it was because Angelus had forced me to follow a vampire's routine without my knowledge.

"Yes," he teased, his voice gritty, "come sit by me, love."

I complied, obviously.

"So Spike," I began, "How are things?"

He looked down on me, his eyes glittering. I shut up.

"I wonder at you, pet," he said, some time later, "I have no idea why he keeps you around."

I flinched, dismayed. No, I didn't care that Spike was so apathetic, I cared that he, a close childe of Angelus, hadn't the faintest idea why she was here. So either Angelus didn't know, or there was no way he was going to take me into his confidence, if not his own childe.

"Fuck it all," I snapped, letting myself fall backwards and knocking my head on the hard pavement. "Spike, do me a favour."

I'm not sure if he answered. My head was spinning.

"Kill me."

He laughed. "You're a treat, Red, you really are. No, by the way."

"Why not?"

"What am I, your bloody servant? Kill yourself. Plus, Angelus'd stake me if I even thought about it."

"Why?" I demanded.

"Because, he likes having you around. I'm buggered if I know why."

And that was that. We talked for a little while. Bonded, you might say. Once you got Spike talking, he seldom shut up. He enjoyed telling me stories of his 'glory days', even though they were far from behind him. My particular favourite was what history now calls 'The Mississippi Massacre of 1963'. Spike, Drusilla and a few of their minions turned every single impoverished African American in the small, backwards town over the span of two weeks. Then, on a not so special day, he let them all loose.

"It was a bloodbath," he assured me, his eyes wide, "We put on thick gloves and beat them to death with burning crosses. We lost a few of our own like that but shit, the irony was marvellous."

It took them three days to wipe out 500 of the townspeople, by then the rest of the world had caught up and they were gone. I have to admit the story didn't chill me as much as it should have. It was interesting to me, all those people getting the retribution they deserved. All that violence, all that death, all to get back what was theirs, all to finally have some power again.

"Suck my cock," he said, later that night when it was entirely unexpected and my hands were tingly and curled into fists. I won't enlighten you any more on that, because it hurt me, and relaying it to you would hurt me further. I'll just say that Spike, rather foolishly, allowed me to walk back to my room by myself. I didn't make a break for it, I didn't attack him. On the way back I grabbed a letter opener from a nearby table and snuck into my room.

I vomited several times before I wrote this entry, I knew I couldn't write in you with bits of him in me. It wouldn't be proper.

**June 25****th****, 1998**

I felt something today. Anger. It was odd, though. I woke up, feeling strange, and before I realised why, this hot anger just coursed through me, making my fingers jerk wildly, curling and gripping the sheets furiously. I use the cliché because it's precisely what it did. I felt anger towards Angelus, then hatred towards myself because I know it's his plan. To make me feel something for him. Nothing was working, the drawing, the isolation, the whoring out of and all-you-can-eat Willow. No, he had to do something extreme.

"He's a bloody drama queen, love," Spike said, in an odd moment of comfort, "it's his nature, in't it? You shouldn't expect so much from him."

I did. Like an idiot.

He had another go at dress-ups. Normally I would wear a gown, but not lace it up because, well, I couldn't. This time Angelus woke me up with another one of his eight-handed minions to get me dressed up. This time the dress was a deep green and more of a nineteenth century dress. More revealing, more relaxing, more degrading as Angelus insisted the minion put on the tights, the camisole, the… everything underneath, while he watched.

Angelus, as well as being a drama queen, was also possessive by nature, but only when it serves his purpose. He allowed the… thing to grope and feel, if only to make me react.

"Get the fuck off me!" I hissed unattractively through clenched teeth. Well, not as unattractive as I surmised, because Angelus stood, adjusted his pants, and ordered the minion out. My arms bent until they were pressed, tense, against my breasts. I couldn't move them until Angelus pulled them away.

"I'm sorry for before." He was referring to the stomach wound he had his hand pressed against. It reminded me how a father would touch his wife's pregnant belly; perchance it should kick and remind him of what he helped create. My arm jerked.

"No, you're not."

"You're right."

"Why do you keep saying it?"

"Because it's fun? Because I like to watch that one second of hope die in your eyes before it begins to light up," he chuckled, his had sliding along my immobile hip, "It's so delightful watching you try to find him."

Angel. How did he know?

"It's all in your eyes. I saw it in my sister's eyes, my mother's eyes… not my father's eyes, no. He knew it wasn't me when he first saw me… it's the women, you see," he said hoarsely, "they can't believe that such a handsome thing can be the devil."

"Get over yourself," I snapped, struggling out of his grip to turn my back on him, hoping for him to hit me into oblivion once more, "The devil would have killed me by now, you're just a nothing... a big nothing."

An endless pause. "That's where you're wrong, darling. You think the devil wants to end your suffering? He wants you to grow old, he wants you to feel the whole spectrum of physical and emotional pain that you can feel. He wants you to feel…" His hand stroked my hair. I didn't pull away, "Love."

"Love?" I said sceptically.

"So he can take it away."

I hid my face from him angrily, tears beginning to sting my eyes, "The devil isn't death, Angelus."

"No," he agreed, "but I am. Come here, face me… NOW, Willow."

He fixed me up, straightening my clothes and brushing my hair, a task so menial, he usually only made me do it, which was fine. This was special. Well, apart from the dizzying blow he landed on the back of my head and the swift kick in my ribs. That wasn't anything new. The flesh under my fingernails burned.

"Get up, get UP!" So many flashbacks. Xander's father. I'd hidden in the closet.

"It's okay," Xander had whispered, kissing me on the forehead, "I'll be fine, just wait in here until I knock three times, okay?"

It smelled like mothballs and blood in there. I prayed and cried silently while my best friend grunted and tried not to scream as he was tossed around the room by his own father. Including Angelus, including the Hellmouth, it was the most terrifying experience of my life. Which explained why I was getting such appropriate flashbacks at the time.

He'd said three times because his father had thrown him into the door twice, and had I come out… well, I don't know.

But there was no Xander here to knock three times.

"GET UP!" Angelus yelled. He was losing it. Good. I sneered, my hands twitching.

"Fuck you."

Second time in my life I'd been knocked unconscious wearing a stupid boofy dress. Had this been a regular beating, I'd not hate Angelus quite so much as I do now. It's the kind of hatred that hollows your belly and numbs your throat. It makes you want to scream as much as it makes you want to physically remove your mouth for fear of speaking it and poisoning the air around you.

I awoke ten days afterwards, which was peculiar in itself. But what was more peculiar was my body: it was covered; neck to toe, with tattoos, now reflected upon calmly due to the four days I spent after my waking in a state of shock. They made no sense to me as I twisted and turned to attempt to see each one, they were symbols and representations and abstracts. The only thing clear to me was the coated my body almost completely, save for random splotches of my familiar, pale skin. I couldn't move my arms for three days, they were so involuntarily tense.

Angelus approached me two days before Spike: only seven hours after I'd discovered the tattoos.

"Back in the day, before slaves were liberated, we would brand them so if they ever strayed, we could easily claim ownership and either hang them, if we felt their loyalties weren't true, or beat them, so they'd know their place and never stray again." I imagined him grinning at this bit of trivia he'd imparted through my haze of shock, but I didn't move or speak. I tried not to breathe, but my bodies defences kicked in and forced me to.

"I'm not normally old-fashioned," he said, sounding either bored or careful, despite being neither, "But I can't help it. You bring out the child in me, particularly with your childish behaviour. And if you persist in acting like one, you will be treated like one." He laughed suddenly, "Well, how I like to treat them, anyway. Do I make myself clear?"

I said nothing. And then he fucked me. And then I hated him.

It was almost like clockwork.

**June 29****th****, 1998**

I was met with a surprise today, journal. Every gown was removed from my closet as I looked on. I didn't bother stopping the minions who took them out, one by one. None of them bothered to leer as usual, because of what my body had become.

Spike had laughed his ass off when he saw me, naked from head to toe yet almost completely clothed with ink. He confided it was he who drugged me, on one of our nightly rendezvous'. I reacted in a way that suggested I was not so totally disenchanted with everything around me and screamed at him. I told him of loyalty, of friendship and obligation, of betrayal while my hands jerked and twitched. He leaned back in his wheelchair and enjoyed the show, his smirk turning into a grin at odd moments. When I finished, he gave me a short applause.

"Can't you see, you're dead? Dying, anyway, one bullet at a time." He bent his fingers into a gun shape and jerked them in my direction, "Don't tell me it hasn't hit you yet."

"It's hit me," I conceded, the pain in my hands fading, "But death… it's not real here."

"So you may as well stay alive," he finished, nodding agreeably, "Very noble. Stupid, but noble. Speaking of which, your pal Bunny is dead."

"Buffy," I corrected instinctively, my hands seized up and numbed, then grabbing his wheelchair by the arm rest and flipping it on its side with an ease and strength I didn't even know I had. He fell uselessly to the floor while I ran indoors.

It's odd though; the tears wouldn't and will not come. Wait, that's not the odd thing, the odd thing is the laughter. It's echoing around me and it's his, Angelus', yet it's my throat that vibrates, it's my stomach that aches.

Death is a funny concept. You're born, you live, and you die. Nothing stops that, except Buffy did. Buffy stopped people dying, she made the life part go on longer, now she's the one dead. How very ironic. How very funny.

He finds me like that. My scarred, hideous body contorted with laughter. This laughter does not end as this life does not end, this waste, this hollow, ugly waste.

"You're beautiful when you laugh," he whispered, his hand caressing my bare, stained shoulder. "You look like a landscape full of broken glass."

Funny, I feel like that too.

"Mmm," he murmurs, "I will paint you."

True to his word, he does. He forsakes his charcoal and paper for oil paints and canvas. We share concentration as he works, I dare not move, even to laugh, merely eye him with the steadfast resolve he his eyeing me and his painting. Those hands, who have painted me, stroked me and hit me, have also killed Bunny… I mean, Buffy. Those cold, dead hands have touched lives with death and drenched themselves in blood. But they are bare, where mine are black, blue, green, red, and yellow… something is amiss.

I am death's blind mistress. I am his broken heart. I am in possession of myself and there is no escaping it, not through birth, life or death, not through hunger or sickness, not through anger or joy.

Maybe, I have aged.

Maybe, I am reborn.

Maybe, Spike slipped me something while we were outside.

Maybe not.

**25****th**** November, 1998**

I suppose you got a shock when you saw the above date, yes? Not more than I did, let me assure you. Apparently, ever since I arrived here Angelus, Spike and various other minions have been drugging me with muscle relaxants and the like, through any means necessary. At first, Angelus snuck them into my olives, which is why he took them to me personally, but then he delighted in giving me the drugs in very sly ways. At one point, he coated the collar of one of my frocks lightly with a potent form of the drug, so when I pulled it on it would brush my lower lip, and then I would lick my lips and then… well, I was gone.

You'll never guess who told me. I was in the midst of nothing in particular on my bed when someone vaguely familiar opened the door and poked her head in. I thought her another minion and considered ignoring her, but she opened her mouth before I had the chance to.

"So this is where daddy plays his little games," she said cheerfully, gliding in and closing the door gently behind her.

Drusilla. Can you believe it? Nor could I. It had been week… well, months, and I had never once seen her. And there she was, staring at me like I was a cross between an exotic flower and someone who had burned off her hair.

"I have to say, you are not what princess saw in her crystal ball. No, not at all."

I apologise, and she threw back her head, cackling wildly. "The toys are broken. How does daddy play? Does he use special tools?"

"Knives," I said conversationally.

"Knives!" she cried happily, "Knives and needles, dear, knives and needles in the hay, which one of them shall come to play?"

Obviously I was confused at this point, so she took it upon herself to enlighten me further.

"In the shadows, daddy creeps, while his toy is fast asleep, and then with sleepy drugs inside his hand, he cuts her down before she stands," she sang happily, before leaping on the bed with me. She crossed her legs and covered her mouth with her hand, giggling. "Shh, don't tell."

"He's been drugging me?"

I received a sharp slap for that, my arms jerked forward and gripped her dress, but she didn't notice that, "Don't tell! Naughty toy. She will be punished. Don't worry; it hurts you more than it hurts me."

"I won't tell, I promise," I said, untangling my fists from her garment.

"You're ugly," she points out in a sudden moment of clarity. "Princess doesn't understand why daddy keeps you."

"Maybe he loves me," I said, not at all offended by her comment. It was true, after all.

"Love," she repeats, "Love, love, love, love. Yes, love is blind. Allow me to poke out your eyes." Her hand prepares to do exactly that before she bursts into giggles, "Love. I would love to poke out your eyes and eat them all up."

"You can, you can if you do me a favour." I was going to ask her for death. Plead, if necessary. She seemed more likely to agree to it than Angelus or Spike. To her, I was a threat. A nothing, as I had accused Angelus of being… god knows how long ago. I was another hallucination in her warped mind, Yes, I was all these things, but I was also Angelus', which only slightly explains her reaction when I requested, "Kill me."

She looks at me as if she'd only just seen me, "I beg your pardon," she said, her accent tighter and more refined, "But it is late in the night and my sisters and I would like to… why, my father? I am sorry, do come in…" She cut herself off with an abrupt scream and landed on me, her hands wrapped strongly and surely around my throat, "You don't ever let him in, precious. It's how wars get started, it's how toys get broken."

"Yes," I said around my lack of air. She grins manically and squeezes tighter. Inky blackness clouded my vision and…

Oh.

Buffy's dead.

Buffy's dead, Buffy's dead, Buffy's dead, dead, dead, dead, dead…

Oh.

**27****th**** November, 1998**

Sorry about that.

Anyway, inky blackness was filling my vision. Drusilla's face was clouding before me and then… it just stopped. She threw herself off me almost as violently as she threw herself on me. Her hands were bent into misshaped claws and her face was tensed and twisted, making her look the monster she was. My arms twitched at the loss.

"In the haystack… in you… in me!" She thrust her hand over my mouth, "Taste it!"

In my confusion, breathlessness and bitter disappointment, I absently licked her hand. It tasted funny. Like chalk and death. I began to felt dizzy and knew, I just knew I'd been drugged. Drusilla began to cry.

"Daddy knows and now princess will be locked in the ivory tower. Ooh, bad toy! Bad princess!" she wailed as I slowly slipped into oblivion. I woke on the 25th of November, and it was only then that I could truly understand what she was saying. Drusilla had visited me without permission. She wanted her curiosity sated, yet Angelus or Spike or somebody had expressly forbade it. She snuck out to see me anyway, thinking she was being stealthy, yet unaware that her sire had been prepared for such disobedience and painted her hands, maybe the rest of her body, in the drug.

It seems that Drusilla and I are both fools, though only one of us can't help ourselves.

Sometimes I wonder who.

**30****th**** November, 1998.**

I'm sorry my writing is so messy, I'll explain to you why with what happened today.

Angelus let me see Buffy today. She's doing well, for a corpse.

We had a dinner party: Me, Spike, Buffy and Drusilla. Half the skin on Drusilla's face had been ripped off, but she still delighted in everything around her like a child. If I looked at her for long enough, I could see a small area of raw flesh magically reproduce skin. She was going to be fine, so this immature and irrational guilt I had was wasted on Drusilla, who kept throwing food at me.

"Stop it, Dru," Angelus said as a pea hit my nose. She looked perfectly innocent when he said that, even as she put another pea into her metal spoon.

I couldn't stop looking at Buffy for at least twenty minutes once I started, and both my arms, from the shoulder and downwards, burned in their sockets. She was blue, yet her blue veins were stark and vivid against her skin. They webbed over her pointlessly, as her body, which was currently slumped over her soup, was no longer functioning. I'd never seen her look so ugly. At one point she started crying black shit from her closed, puffy eyelids, and it led me to wonder how Angelus had actually killed her, as her body was free of marks.

"Choked her," he lied. My left arm jerked in his direction.

This then led to an argument between the two male vampires. Spike lamented the waste of slayer's blood, and Angelus retorted with a reminder of an incident on a certain subway train with a certain slayer. Spike shut up about it.

I took a steak knife from the table and plunged it into my heart.

Attempted to, anyway. Angelus was even faster than I first surmised. He took the knife, flipped it and stabbed it through my hand, securing me to the table. It felt unreal for a few moments before I saw the blood pool under my hand and began to scream. I screamed and screamed, journal, it hurt so much. Worse than my first fuck, worse than being bitten, worse than my best friend decomposing right beside me. It was a selfish pain, journal, and it made my neck and half my face go numb, making me feel a sudden rush of empathy for Drusilla that I didn't need or want. My arms were tensed so badly, I thought I could see sparks of electricity coming out of them.

Her laughter echoed louder than my screams. Spike looked like he was enjoying himself too, but Angelus… he looked pissed. Which is so funny, now I think about it, considering which one of us had a knife through the hand. But I didn't laugh. I was like a panicked animal, I jerked around and quivered unwillingly, my vision clouded angrily, ignoring my furious blinking. I was shaking so much, I could feel my flesh tear with every movement, but I couldn't stop. I also couldn't hear Angelus, who was talking to me and, god, he was touching me. My body reacted horribly, seizing and convulsing against his caresses meant to comfort. My other arm tugged at the table cloth viciously.

I heard the word 'love' and threw myself away from him and fell into Buffy's body. The knife made a clean cut right down the centre of my hand, splitting it open. I blacked out after that. When I woke up, my hand was stitched up and bandaged, which freaked me out more than if I'd woken up to and open, running and infected wound, and a broken rib for good measure. For ten minutes I imagined myself looking as I did. Me, the freak with a knife through her hand, shaking like mad while Angelus tried to soothe me and Drusilla and Spike watched on like I was entertainment. I think I was, considering how morbidly sadistic vampires are.

But I'd heard love.

This confused me more than anything. Maybe I was right when I was teasing Drusilla that day. Maybe Angelus does love me. As much as someone without the ability to love can love something. It did explain a great deal. Why he kept me around despite my flawed disposition and disfigured body. Why he removed the mirror from the bathroom and stole the letter opener and stopped me from stabbing myself tonight at dinner. What else had I heard "It hurt me more than it hurt you,"?

Un-fucking-likely, and the knife factor springs to mind once again.

Anyway, the reason I bring up this development… no, it's not just because it was a particularly fucked up event, because they have those nearly every day in this house, and had I wrote about each one, this journal would be filled and I would have nothing to do.

No, it was the pain. The pain that made me feel helpless and so utterly fucked over I couldn't stop shaking. It was like one of those epiphanies I've read about but never really felt. Well, I don't remember feeling one of them. But the point is I felt it then, and feel it now just as strong.

I don't need this. I don't deserve this. I'm here because of Angelus' selfish desires and nothing more. I've gone through enough shit for one lifetime so it seems logical that I should either just stop going through more shit, or die.

The latter is no longer acceptable. There is no way I'm going to die in here. So Angelus doesn't want me to die? Says it'll hurt him more than it'll hurt me? Fine. He'll be the one to die, and it'll definitely hurt him more than it'll hurt me. He can count on that.

My hands tingled.

**December 3****rd****, 1998.**

After a few days plotting, my solution came in the form of a vamp on four wheels. He rolled in without airs and grabbed my arm (I was on the floor) and threw me painfully against the edge of my one and only desk. It was made of cheap pine, which explains why it broke apart as easily as it did when Spike threw me into it, again and again.

Make no mistake, it hurt, but I'm not angry with Spike. Heh, not even when he punched me square in the jaw and I passed out for a few minutes. He didn't leave. When I awoke he was playing with a part of the table leg with a grim expression on his face. He threw me the stake, and through the haze of blood, I caught it.

"There," he said, "Now get on with it."

He'd been reading my journal. I couldn't say I was exactly surprised, more worried. If Spike had read my journal, surely any other vampires could have read it. Including ones who were loyal to Angelus. Including Angelus.

"I'm the only one," he said, reading my mind, "The others aren't allowed."

"Why are you?" I said groggily.

"I'm not," he replied.

"Then why do you?"

"It's a laugh, Red, a fucking riot," he said, before laughing hoarsely and explaining his favourite bits.

Understand, I was still concussed. But I guess being so on a daily basis numbs one to it, because I was able to contemplate what he said.

"… and you go 'are you stoned?' He was, actually. He was hunting in the bad part of town and fed off a group of kids so high on crystal meth they didn't give a shit what he was doing…"

"You know I want to kill Angelus," I stated, interrupting him and possibly facing some more one-on-one time with the table. He just shrugged and lit up a cigarette.

"Well, you're being blatantly obvious pet," he snickered, "I mean, the other night," he tsked, hollowing his cheeks around the cigarette, "You tore your hand in half rather than have him touch you, or tell you he loves you." His tongue rolled over the word 'love' like it was something distasteful. I ignored it.

"You know I'm going to do it," I said seriously from my position on the floor while a line of blood trickled down my chin. He eyed it appreciatively but made no move towards me.

"I know you're going to try," he said, "And I respect that, which is why I'm going to help you."

"You hate him?"

"I love him," he said, with a grin, "I also want him dead. This is where you come in."

Sometimes I think Spike is crazier than all of us put together.

We still had our little talks, despite his treachery. I know it's stupid, journal, but despite the fact he betrays me more often than Angelus hits me, he's the only constant in my life. And right now, with my new resolve, that's more important than ever. I'm not saying he's predictable. I mean, one time he handed me a burning cigarette and asked me to burn 'S & W 4EVA' in his pale under arm. I couldn't stop laughing, even with the smell of burning flesh in my nostrils. The next day he made me paint his nails with 'Ebony Nightmare' which was just a fancy nail polish name for black. The next day he beat the shit out of me. See? Nowhere near predictable, which explains my surprise when he offered to help me kill Angelus.

"Why can't you do it? Why do you need me?" Apparently being concussed made me ask a lot of questions, but he didn't seem to mind.

His brow furrowed, "He doesn't let anyone as close as you. Fuck knows why," he added, answering my next question. His eyes flickered over to meet mine.

It sounds silly but when we were looking at each other, I felt this warmth that I hadn't in a long time. I felt like… like I could crawl onto his lap and he would hold me. I told you, it was stupid. And contrary to what usually happened with Angelus, he didn't snap me out of my fantasy with a well-placed punch or kick, he held out his hand.

"Come here," he said gravely, his hand outstretched. I struggled to cooperate, but I cursed my body as it refused to oblige the one time in my life here that I wanted it to. It didn't matter though, because Spike wheeled himself over and just picked me up, cradled me on his lap like I was feather light. His hand drifted over a circular symbol that surrounded my belly button. Spike had once told me that it was a symbol that meant 'aborted'. It held no significance to me until Spike was touching it then.

"What do you want me to do?" I whispered, causing more blood to drip from my lips. He followed it with his eyes.

"Kiss me."

Nothing, nothing, nothing had ever felt like this. No, not here. Angelus would never allow it. I would never allow it, lest it give me hope or some other childish notion. But I'm human, journal, am I not? Yes, and this was the biggest confirmation of my humanity since Angelus stabbed me through the hand.

It wasn't the most romantic kiss in the world. I was trembling so badly, our mouths kept missing and sliding past each other. He kept forsaking the actual kiss to lap up blood from my chin and nose. My concussion got the better of me several times, but Spike would just nudge me a little harder with his lips, and I would wake up and join in again. But then… then there was that zing. That zing I got before Angelus bit me in the stomach, only Spike's fangs were in hiding and he was just kissing me. And the zing that shot through me was… lovely. It felt good and soft. Something I could just reach out and grab… something Angelus couldn't touch, even if he needed to.

I laughed right into Spike's mouth at the thought. He laughed back and nibbled at my bottom lip sweetly, and by that time, my mouth no longer tasted like blood. It tasted like tobacco and nothing else. Nothing else except him. My arms convulsed in appreciation.

Spike looked unfazed as he finally pulled away, but he smiled at me and escorted me to my bed. I though he was going to fuck me, and I tensed in readiness, but he just continued to smile as he let me lay on it. He took the stake he made and hid it under my pillow. There was something different about him, but at the time I couldn't tell what.

"Sleep tight, Red," he said, manoeuvring himself towards the door, "big day tomorrow."

It was only then, while he said that, I realised what was different about him. He was breathing.

**December 7****th****, 1998.**

Spike over-compensated for his niceness a few days ago by removing one of my fingers while I was drugged out of my mind.

"It's only the pinky, Red," he said, patting me on the shoulder, "You won't miss it." My arm struck out at him unwillingly, but he just dodged it and laughed, before rolling out of the room.

Yes, it was the pinky on my left hand that I hadn't really noticed until it was gone, but I did miss it. I missed it as much as I missed every other thing that Spike and Angelus had stolen from me while I was here. My innocence, my skin, my best friend, my life… and now my pinky finger.

I wondered, wildly, at the time when my injury felt detached from my person, what my left hand did to deserve all this. It had to be covered in tattoos, it had to touch the decaying skin of someone it loved, it had to have a serrated knife split it in two and then have one of its fingers removed. Then I realised it was me. I must have done something, but something good. I did something good in another life to make me not left-handed. For if I was, there would be no way for me to tell someone, well you, journal, about what happened today.

Because today, December 7th (remember that), is the day that Angelus died. Again. For real. Hm, how do I put it? Today is the day that Angelus is nothing more than dust in the wind.

It was a bit of an anti-climax really. I was still weepy and waily over my lost finger, snivelling and holding my hand to my tattooed breasts and cradling it, when Angelus came in, his arms soaked in blood up to his elbows. I was to find out later that it was Spike's blood, but I'll get back to that in a minute.

He knelt before me, and for a startling and insane moment I thought he was going to propose marriage when he reached into his back pocket. But it turned out to just be a finger. A pinky finger, to be precise. It was smeared in blood and I thought it to be mine, although when he shoved it into my hands I saw the tiny nail had a coat of chipped 'Ebony Nightmare' on its surface, and realised it was Spike's.

"An eye for an eye," he said accurately.

I nodded, putting the tiny finger aside.

He grabbed my long hair, making me arch forward until we were nose to nose, "You didn't say thank you," he pointed out, jerking my hair a little more so our noses squished together.

"I love Spike," I said truthfully, "It wouldn't be right to thank you."

"Right?" he said incredulously, before standing up abruptly and backhanding me. It was sloppy, and barely hurt, but I fell backwards anyway. "It seems to me, Willow dear, that you're no longer aware of the concept. This would make you a liar. Or a hypocrite. And I can't stand either. So pick."

I smiled at him and shook my head, "You can't do that."

His eyes narrowed, but his reply was absent-minded, "Do what? I can do whatever I want."

It made me wonder, journal. When had he become the child and I the adult? Perhaps it was always this way. Perhaps he was turned as a man, still a child inside and I just hadn't picked it up before now. Maybe… it was all about power. Yes, I knew this. Earlier, before I became… this. Me, now. I always knew it was about power. Who has it, who does not. You only have to look at Angelus to see he does. But I don't see Angelus any more, all I see is me.

"You can't tell me what to do," I said, with such… sureness, so much clarity. I knew it was true, I just knew it and what's more, I feel it.

He smirked, "I beg to differ."

"Do you?" And I was detached from it all, journal. The power… you'll never know it. Largely because you're a book, but most importantly you're not me. Me, me, ME. Before I knew it, I was up on my knees. My scarred, tattooed body, for once displayed proudly, "No, I don't think you do. I don't think you can beg to differ," I smirked, my fingers aching delightfully, "You can beg, but it won't be much help."

Angelus' phrases coming from my lips.

Fucking clockwork.

He said something, something derisive, but I was above it. I flicked my fingers in his direction and shit, it was like an orgasm. Or how I would imagine one to be. Angelus was never really that attentive, as a lover. And Spike and I… we were in love, but he couldn't touch me like that… not with Angelus around.

Well, that's something soon to be rectified, I thought, watching Angelus' mouth bleed.

"What are you doing?" he said thickly, when I was finally able to concentrate on him. So small. So… not worth it, forced up against the wall while his mouth dripped with his own sustenance.

"I should think that of all people, you would know," I explained boredly. Because I _was_ bored. I was bored out of my mind. My feet left the bed and never met ground, "I'm killing you."

How? Why? Who cares? My hand flew forward, and he responded by dying almost instantly, an 'I love you' on his grey lips, even as they fell to pieces as ash.

I came off my high as he died, my feet firmly planted on the soft bed. I leapt off it, my arms hot, but finally moving of my own violation.

I wept, but not for Angel. He was wept for the minute he became Angelus and not a minute after. Certainly not for Angelus, who was a pathetic, confused demon who'd thought he'd loved me. Who thought a great deal but never really acted. Who'd poisoned a slayer to defeat her, because she had found my whereabouts and was making plans to rescue me. Yes, Spike talks a great deal.

No, I wept for Willow. Poor, stupid Willow. Because she was the only one who truly died today. And of all of them, she was the only one who could have possibly mourned the loss as adequately as she deserved. I could not, now, you see. I'm above it.

But I will miss her.

_Fin._


End file.
